Dear Teachers,In order to ensure that our students are graduating both college and career ready, we need to take into account the demands employers have of their employees. The current job market does not resemble the one of a decade ago. Students of today face higher competition for fewer jobs, and need to be prepared. Business leaders expect employees to be problem solvers. In order to solve a problem, you must first define the problem by asking the correct questions (Wagner, 2014). Once the problem is identified, then you can critically think about potential solutions, and collaborate with colleagues to solve them (Wagner, 2014).So how do we accomplish this? Many people say we need to create a “classroom of the future” (Mortensen, 2014). While this is a catchy sounding phrase, we don’t need these classrooms in a future setting, we need them now. In 2016, employers applied for 233,000 H1B visas to bring highly skilled workers into the United States (O’Brien, 2016). H1B visas are provided when employers need highly skilled work done within the United States (Understanding H1B Visa requirements). The fast paced world with constant changes and complexity requires life long learners with intellectual agility and adaptability (Wagner, 2014). People who can jump from task to task and apply what they have learned to what they experience.Today's students have access to an enormous montage of information, more than any previous generation. The internet is a ubiquitous and expanding entity, as such educational leaders need to take stock of their ability to meet the needs of their students (Schrum & Levine, 2009). Meeting needs doesn’t mean providing access to information, students need to know what to do with that information. Retrieving the information isn’t enough, students need to dig into the complexity and explore the connections the information provides (Mortensen, 2014).I know what you’re all thinking, “How are we going to manage this change to a ‘new’ educational paradigm?” It is simple. We are going to work together. We are going to work on our culture and transform it into one that embraces technology (Schrum & Levine, 2009). Our focus is not going to be on the end goal of test scores, but our students will experience the journey of learning, High Tech High, a model school for 21st Century learning enjoys this focus. Their focus is so intense on the journey, that they don’t offer AP courses, because those courses focus on the end result of testing, not the journey of learning (Wagner, 2014).The district has informed us that we will be moving into a One to One environment next year. After polling the community, and taking a detailed inventory of district assets it has been decided to move towards a BYOD model. This model requires students to bring their own technology device to school for internet access (Schrum & Levine, 2009). Many of you have previously expressed concern about a BYOD model, however, we are going to talk about that in our next faculty meeting. The short answer is that we will be doing a lot of our work in the cloud as a way to satisfy the differences in platforms (Schrum & Levine, 2009).Our professional development will be a large part of our new culture. PD is not going to be as it has been, you go to a session, sit there, and have the instructor sign the form that you served your PD time (Schrum & Levine, 2009). This year we will experience a new model of professional development. We will begin Design Thinking projects in our grade level PLC’s. These projects will exemplify the type of learning our students will experience. These projects will be long term and have stages for each component. Primarily, your team will come up with a direction you want to take your grade level. You will then use the Design Thinking stages to come up with a mechanism to achieve the goal. Below is a general outline of the Design Thinking process, which we will go over in more detail at our next staff meeting:Discovery Phase: This is the phase that contains your research. The research is related to your topic, but don’t limit yourself. If the research leads you in unknown directions, then Interpretation Phase: This phase is where you will look at your data and see what current state the research is showing.Ideation Phase: In this phase you will come up with as many possible solutions to achieve your goal, and then focus on one possible solution and flush out guidelines for creation.Experimentation Phase: You will create your prototype solution, and present it to another PLC for evaluation and recommendations.Evolution Phase: This is where we will examine the learning opportunities contained within your design thinking project. You will also share your project with an audience for further feedback.In the big picture, using Design Thinking can work well for many of the challenges we face as a staff, including the upcoming opportunity for us to adopt new textbooks, and replace the antiquated Read 180 program. I can’t help but notice the similarities between the Design Thinking method and classroom gamification. Both Design Thinking and Gamification provide opportunities for participants to reflect and refine their processes in order to achieve the desired result (Schrum and Levine, 2009). That is what this year is going to be about. Reflecting on our processes and refining them to prepare our students to graduate career and college ready.I look forward to a successful school year.Thank You,Michael A. O’Hagan